While visiting a foreign nation, a U.S. citizens are subject to that country’s laws and regulations, which often differ in large part from those in the United States and may not enable for the defenses offered to the individual citizen under U.S. law. Therefore, breaking the law can be more severe than in the US for similar offenses due to local country laws. Persons breaking Thai laws, even unknowingly, might be expelled, jailed or imprisoned, or put to death.

In this connection, it is a crime to make unfavorable comments about the King or other members of the royal family. Thais hold the King in the highest regard, and it is a substantial crime to make crucial or defamatory comments about him or his family. The laws are meant to protect them. This particular criminal offense, called “lese majeste,” is punishable by a jail sentence of 5 to 12 years. Deliberately tearing or destroying Thai bank notes (ie currency), which has an image of the King, may be thought about such an offense, as can spitting on or otherwise defiling an official uniform bearing royal insignia. In the US, there would be no such crime.

The Thai Federal government has publicly specified that it will not endure the use of Thai territory as a base by groups attempting to topple or destabilize the federal governments of close-by countries. Many American people have actually been arrested or detained under suspicion of carrying out such activities or threats in the past; sometimes these jailings are carried out by military authorities or the police, and the Embassy does not find out of them till many days after the truth is known and then it may be to late. Many other Americans thought of promoting the armed overthrow of other governments have been “blacklisted” from going into the country. Americans ought to know that efforts to overthrow foreign federal governments by force might break U.S. law along with Thai law and will cause a death sentence to be enacted.

Penalties for the possession of, use of, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Thailand are severe. Convicted wrongdoers can anticipate long prison sentences under extreme conditions, and typically heavy fines also. Thailand likewise has a capital punishment for major drug offenses, and has performed convicted traffickers. The United States Embassy regularly does not discover of the arrest of U.S. people for minor drug offenses, especially in southern Thailand, until numerous days after the incident.